Monday, December 31, 2007

Having done some digging around, I can find no mention of the terrible fate of one Mr. Ed Snell outside of the fanatical, anti-choice realm. Excepting, of course, for those that rebut the cuckoos. The sad story of Snell, his rolling platform and humpty-dumpty act are burning up the foetus-fetish nets. There is outrage and whining at the silence of the media concerning the grave injustice alleged to have been perpetrated upon Snell's person. There is a great rending of clothing and pulling out of hair due to the Harrisburg Police's cavalier attitude to the supposed assault.

The statement that got this whole ball of snot rolling came from one Pastor John McTernan. Seems this isn't the first "injury" suffered by Snell or others of McTernan's gang. Since reputable media sources apparently recognize lunatic, mouth breathing doinks when they see them, I had to visit the cess-lakes of the foetus jamboree to glean what I could.

What kind of swell guy is Ed Snell? Well he is certainly known in his neighbourhood!

Ed Snell, pro-life activist who displays pictures of aborted fetuses and other anti-abortion signs in his yard, is criticized by neighbors who put anti-Ed Snell signs in their yards.

Man Pushes Envelope By Showing His Neighbors Abortion Reality April 10, 2003 - Ed Snell planted a mess of those big antiabortion signs in his front yard in Harrisburg, PA. His neighbors didn't like it.

I guess his neighbours didn't like it. But give old Ed points for dedication.

Pro-lifers from the District, Virginia and Maryland were joined by a contingent of seven Harrisburg pro-lifers, led by Ed Snell, who have picketed McLeod’s Hillcrest clinic in Harrisburg for 16 years.

Since the article cited is from 2004, seems old Ed has been harassing folks at the Harrisburg clinic for nineteen years and he still has time to take his act on the road. What a guy. Now this blog is chock full of the adventures of gravity stricken Ed Snell and that whacky cult of foetal fanatics. Here are some highlights of the terrible injuries that seem to befall these crazy kids.

Another pro-life advocate, Ed Snell, was charged with disorderly conduct after attempting to hand tracts to pregnant women who were entering the clinic. The charges were later dropped.

"Ed was injured during the arrest," McTernan said. "They ratcheted the cuffs on him real tight. He took pictures after the arrest and you could see the marks and swelling where they had cuffed him. He told them they were tight and they refused to do anything."

and then...

McTernan told WND another protester was attacked and hit over the head with a board by a pro-choice protestor. "She suffered injury to her neck as a result of this blow that she received, but yet, they trump up charges against us," he said.

with no help from the eeevil polices...

"They watched one woman get beaten. She had to be put in the hospital," McTernan said. "High speed cars have attempted to run us over. We have videos of most of it. They won't do anything."

"Last I spoke with her, the doctor said she was going to have to have an operation on her left arm because she suffered nerve damage from the arrest," McTernan said.

shocking I tells ya, but it ain't no picture without high speed chase scenes...

In one incident, McTernan said an 18-wheeler tried to run over John Holman, one of his fellow pro-life advocates. Holman jumped out of the way to avoid the truck and was arrested for criminal trespass after he landed on a strip of property the clinic claims to own, according to McTernan.

Now I'm kind of curious if maybe Pastor McTernan might have mistook the name of the 18 wheel dodging Holman. I couldn't find anything about a John Holman but just hit the Google with the name Dan Holman and it is a whole other kettle of shite. Just saying.

Anyway, according to the crackpots at Tradition, Family and Property (a group whose origins are nicely sorted by Dr. Dawg) the alleged assault on Mr. Snell went like this:

...the man became furious, jumped the fence and, in the words of Mr. McTernan, “leaped on the vehicle with Ed and catapulted him off of the vehicle and onto the ground.” Mr. Snell hit his back and head on the pavement and was knocked unconscious.

So the alleged perpetrator must be one athletic lad. He just up and jumped a seven foot fence, leapt onto a vehicle mounted platform and catapulted someone to the ground. Just like that. Well, since arrest records are public documents and despite all of the whining about police indifference, an arrest was apparently made.

Once the extent of Mr. Snell’s injuries were discovered, the assailant was arrested.

We'll have to wait and see what shakes out. I wouldn't be surprised to find that Ed Snell got a little too bellicose for his own good and in his insane fervor to interfere with other people's private lives, the stupid fuck wandered off the edge of his platform and sucked pavement. Given that the foetus fetish movement is very keen on recording their heroic, personal intrusions and the offended reactions of those whose business they meddle in, I hope the police subpoena any and all video tapes and recordings made at the protest that morning. If indeed Mr. Snell did not suffer an assault as described, then I'll second the alleged statement of the receptionist from the clinic, he got what he deserved and he earned what he got.

We have a new contestant in the Blogging Tory stupidverse, kids, and he looks like a keeper. Shorter Mesopotamia West:

Your blatant enemy propaganda campaign of printing pictures of dead Canadian soldiers sickens me. People have no right to be upset until we hit a really spectacular casualty number like, say, 10,000 or so. Sheesh.

Making sweeping generalizations like this piece of garbage merely reinforces the commonly held belief that you have not a hot fucking clue what you’re talking about.

(L)iberals insult soldiers each day in the media, on blogs, and on the street. They do it in primarily two ways. They treat soldiers as either victims or as felons.

It's just another way in which (L)iberals give comfort to the enemy.

Here’s a little challenge for you, “Paul”. I defy you to find three examples of respected liberal pundits, (bloggers, writers, columnists, are you with me?) calling soldiers “victims or felons”. The lunatic fringe doesn’t count, and no, astonishingly enough, they’re not the same thing.

I’ll counter it with three examples of respected conservative pundits writing about the Walter Reed scandal that doesn’t somehow blame the Democrats while excusing the real culprit – the Bush Administration.

Ready to put your money where your mouth is?

Still waiting. I guess Poppa Junker is too busy blogging about Muslims and monsters and ecophobes. Oh my!

Golly ... even the Blogging Tories can tell when Glorious Leader is getting a mite grumpy:

It seems to me, however, that Mr Harper is losing his own commitment to the Afghan mission; maybe he never really was that serious about it, imagining rather along the lines of Paul Martin that it wouldn't be that big a deal and would provide domestic political (remember that first visit to Kandahar in March 2006?) and international diplomatic rewards. The reality has proved rather different and difficult. Perhaps that's why the Prime Minister is so ineffective at "selling" the mission.

Why, yes, and it does appear that Prime Minister Grumpy McAngry is losing interest in his convenient, little designer war 'cuz, gosh darn it, it's just not going according to the script and people are getting killed and the voters are getting a tad restless and it just wasn't supposed to happen this way, was it, and where are the cheering crowds, he was promised cheering crowds, damn it! I mean, what the fuck, eh?

I don't agree Mark.I think what you are seeing is a PM who is getting frustrated fighting the enemies of this mission, both domestic and foreign.As a strategic thinker, I can only imagine the contempt he must feel for those who do not see why our prevailing in this conflict is so important.

Oh, dear. Apparently, it's your fault. You're not wearing that red shirt and you're not putting that yellow ribbon on your car and you have the temerity to disagree with your government. It's enough to make the baby Jesus cry, isn't it? And the bad craziness continues:

I can sense the frustration is because of the asinine questions put to him by the ever hateful reporters and journalists. It seems they have become stupid in their quest to "get Harper".

Those would, of course, be the same journalists that HM PM Grumpy will have nothing to do with. Yeah, it's a tough job, but someone has to avoid doing it.

When raving pro-life whackjobs kill abortion doctors and clinic escorts, they’re merely doing “God’s” work by trying to protect all those pre-born zygotes. But when someone accompanying a woman into an abortion clinic knocks a “veteran pro-lifer” activist off the platform he built on top of his car so he can “persuade women entering the clinic not to abort their pre-born children” by shouting over the 7-foot privacy fence ... well, that’s just monstrous.

And furthermore. Strangest thing - when I Google the Harrisburg local news for coverage, I get nothing from the Harrisburg Patriot-News or WHP which is the CBS affiliate. Dr. Dawg has more at his joint.

Stephen Harper is the MOST ADMIRED LEADER in the entire world only nobody’s talking about it because the MSM is biased against conservatives. The fact that Harper’s lowest ratings came in Canada is just further proof of their disgustingly slanted coverage. I smell conspiracy.

Stay tuned while I fisk the shit out of this bias in a completely non-partisan manner. Did I mention the press is biased? I did? Good.

Come on, move along, people. After all, there can’t possibly be a connection between Bhutto’s assassination and Musharraf’s attempt to keep his iron grasp on power. From this morning's Washington Post:

Nationwide rioting brought life in Pakistan to a standstill Saturday and forced government officials to consider delaying next month's elections, as discord spread over the killing of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

And further down in the same article:

Pakistanis are scheduled to go to the polls Jan. 8, but with the nation on edge, the election commission was expected to convene an emergency meeting Monday to decide whether to postpone the long-awaited vote. Rioters have targeted the commission's offices, and several have been burned to the ground.

The elections, which will determine who controls Parliament and shares power with President Pervez Musharraf, are seen both here and abroad as a test of Musharraf's willingness to move toward restoring democracy. In addition to the concerns about violence marring the vote, opposition groups have long said they believe that Musharraf and his allies plan to rig the balloting.

Not surprisingly, some of the Blogging Tories are still ever so thrilled at being able to paint swarthy brown people as uncontrollable savages:

Honour Killings in Canada?

Darcey has a fascinating discussion going on at DMB about so-called 'Honour Killings'.

Author Ellen R. Sheeley has left a comment that is well worth the read:

Imam Shakir is being disingenuous and playing to the cultural/moral relativists, of which there seem to be plenty.

Aqsa Parvez's death was an "honor" killing, and "honor" killings will never be properly addressed if people aren't even willing to admit to what they are. They are a form of domestic violence, but a very specific form, with different roots, different triggers, different modus operandi, and different ways of preventing them...

I am planning to pick up this thread sometime in the near future, since these issues now appear to be affecting Canada.

You do that, JoJo. And, hey, feel free to throw in a little balance if you have the room for it:

MISSISSAUGA, Ont. - Her refusal to wear a hijab may not have been a factor in the death of a Muslim Toronto teen last week, friends of her family said Saturday...

Some classmates have said the girl's insistence on not wearing the hijab led to intense family squabbles, but another friend told CanWest News Service Saturday the traditional Islamic clothing was not a major factor and that other girls in the family did not wear the hijab.

Yeah, that kind of makes a mess of a perfectly good talking point, doesn't it, JoJo? So I'll understand if you can't quite fit it in.

KKKate, in yet another too precious “Settled Science” post, links to a blog debunking yet another blog’s debunking of the so-called report released by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee which shrieks “Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007”!!!1!!1!

Still with me? Good.

KKKate, and by extension, the “Editors” at the Climate Resistance blog (puh-leeeze ... was Justice League already taken?) are humping the fact that the Senate EPW report, in their narrow little minds, has completely gutted the veracity of the IPCC report on global warming with breathless claims including:

The following scientists named in this report have expressed a range of views from skepticism to outright rejection of predictions of catastrophic man-made global warming. As in all science, there is no lock step single view.

Well, that convinces me. I don’t know what I was thinking buying all those weird light bulbs, taking the bus to work instead of driving, and installing a brand new, high-efficiency gas furnace. My face is red. Not.

Because you see there’s one minor issue with this definitive Senate report – it was written by the Republican minority side of the EPW headed by none other than Sen. Inhofe (R-Fucktard/Exxon), global warming denier extraordinaire. And the 400 skeptical scientists? Well, Climate Progress takes care of that claim rather nicely.

“Padded” would be an extremely generous description of this list of “prominent scientists.” Some would use the word “laughable” (though not the N.Y. Times‘ Andy Revkin, see below). For instance, since when have economists, who are pervasive on this list, become scientists, and why should we care what they think about climate science?

I’m not certain a dozen on the list would qualify as “prominent scientists,” and many of those, like Freeman Dyson — a theoretical physicist — have no expertise in climate science whatsoever. I have previously debunked his spurious and uninformed claims, although I’m not sure why one has to debunk someone who seriously pushed the idea of creating a rocket ship powered by detonating nuclear bombs! Seriously.

I realize that KKKate will now attempt to debunk the debunking of her debunking but it’s really hard to take someone seriously when their rebuttal consists of sticking their fingers in their ears and saying “La, la, la, la, la ... I can’t heeearrrr yooouuuu!”

And furthermore. With Poppa Junker "Paul" on your side, there’s no end to the fun.

Double ewwww.Tootsie? Seriously? I bet you say that to all the girls, gramps.

Blah. I have one of those excellent fevers that feel sort of like a hallucinatory roller coaster of Steadman-esque visions that devolve into shivers and generalized misery. I know who gave me this cold and I'm coming to your house and I'm going to lick all your cutlery, you plague spreading degenerate bastard.

Update. I realize that Cheryl over at TGB has already addressed this but I don't think the Ass Monkey's spittle-flecked misogyny, or his pathetic attempt at justification, can get nearly enough play. Remember, this is why we mock them.

Curiously, for a group of wanks who couldn't control their gushing adoration for steely-eyed rocket man Commander Chimpy McChimpster just a couple years ago, the BTs have really pulled back on their dreamy man-crush on George W. Bunnypants. I wonder why that is.

Friday, December 28, 2007

I shit you not, Five Feet of Crazy™ has a picture of a pink (yes, I said pink) Remington 870 20-Ga. junior shotgun labelled “the perfect gun for me”. She then works herself into a full-blown gun-fetishistgasm over a Taurus Millenium Pro 9mm Semi-Auto Pistol with an adorable pink polymer grip which is just like the cutest evah!!

Is anyone else completely disturbed by the idea of this raving lunatic being armed? With a fucking pink gun?

Heh. I knew this reminded me of something ... "My God, even their Uzis are pink!!"

I don't want to be cruel ... well, OK, I do. After pissing and moaning like the whiny little shit that he is about my alleged cowardice and getting his ass handed to him because of it, Blogging Tory "The Right Is Where It Sat" has disabled new comments on that blog post.

Rudy Giuliani, man of the people, discussing Republican candidates and health care. And when I say people, I actually mean Republicans with seven figure bank accounts who are completely divorced from reality. Via Swampland:

"I suspect that our Democratic colleagues would get that question more often in a Democratic audience than we get in a Republican audience," he said. "Maybe more Democrats are concerned about their health care than Republicans, maybe because Republicans have health care or maybe Republicans generally like the idea of private solutions."

On Afghanistan, the dominant defence and foreign policy file, Harper again looks ahead to tough choices. Rather than talking up the military mission in Kandahar as an inspiring undertaking, he used the year-end sit-down to vent frustration at slow progress in building a self-sufficient Afghan government. “You know, the United Nations and our allies will have been in Afghanistan 10 years in 2011. For God’s sakes, Germany was basically fully restored within four years; Germany joined NATO ten years after it was conquered.”

Somebody please tell me that Captain Charisma didn't just compare World War II Germany to present-day Afghanistan. Please don't tell me that he honestly can't tell the difference between an actual war between sovereign nations, and a police action against nebulous and ill-defined global "terror."

Please tell me that my home and native land is not being governed by someone that fucking imbecilic.

Jonah Goldberg is a contributing editor to National Review and was the founding editor of “National Review Online.” He is a weekly columnist for the Los Angeles Times and his syndicated column appears regularly in the Chicago Tribune, New York Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle Kansas City Star, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Washington Examiner, Miami Herald, Manchester Union Leader and scores of other newspapers.

Goldberg is currently a member of the Board of Contributors to USA Today. In the past he's served as a media critic for both Brill's Content and The American Enterprise and a Washington Columnist for the Times of London. He has written about politics and culture for The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, The LA Times, Commentary, The Public Interest, The Wilson Quarterly, The Weekly Standard, Slate, TheStreet.com, New York Post, Women's Quarterly and Food and Wine and other publications.

Goldberg was a regular political commentator on CNN and has served as a guest host on “Crossfire” and as a regular panelist on Wolf Blitzer's “Late Edition.” Other television appearances include “Good Morning America,” “Larry King Live,” “Today,” “Nightline,” “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” “Politically Incorrect,” “Special Report with Brit Hume,” “Geraldo,” “NBC Nightly News” and numerous other television and radio programs. He was a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington D.C.

A former senior producer of the award-winning series “Think Tank with Ben Wattenberg” on PBS, he has written and produced several PBS documentaries and specials. He is the 2001 winner of the prestigious Lowell Thomas Award. His book, Liberal Fascism, will be published January 8, 2008 by Random House (Doubleday).

And when you take all that prodigious talent and unleash it, you get ... this.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

Unless, of course, we’re talking about KKKate and the book in question is teh Doughy Pantload’s breathlessly not-awaited magnum opus Liberal Fascism: From Mussolini to Liberace to Bill Clinton: You Connect the Bloodstained, Leftwing Surrender Monkey Dots.

You know, this might actually be hovering right around KKKate's reading level. She probably won't even need to ask anyone to help her with the big words - I hear it doesn't have very many.

Just when I think I can’t possibly be surprised by the unbearable stupidity that is the Bush Administration, something like this spot of heinous fuckery turns up and I’m proven wrong yet again. Via ThinkProgress:

In a new piece in Commentary magazine, Jay Lefkowitz — who advised Bush on stem cells — reveals how the President formulated his 2001 policy. While Bush heard from a variety of groups on both sides of the issue, the turning point appeared to come when Lefkowitz read from Aldous Huxley’s fictional novel, Brave New World, and scared Bush:

A few days later, I brought into the Oval Office my copy of Brave New World, Aldous Huxley’s 1932 anti-utopian novel, and as I read passages aloud imagining a future in which humans would be bred in hatcheries, a chill came over the room.

“We’re tinkering with the boundaries of life here,” Bush said when I finished. “We’re on the edge of a cliff. And if we take a step off the cliff, there’s no going back. Perhaps we should only take one step at a time.”

I’m sorry but after reading that, I keep picturing Dubya in his G.I. Joe footie pyjamas with the covers pulled up to his nose while Lefkowitz reads him his scary bedtime story. And now it’s in your head, too. Hey, I believe in sharing.

Blogging Tory and legend in his own mind Gerry Nicholls has something he wants to share with you:

Commenting on an article detailing the Prime Minister's alleged mood swings and temper, I wrote, "even the Dalai Lama would likely lose his cool if he had to deal with the likes of Stephane Dion, Gilles Duceppe and Jack Layton."

There, you see? So if I occasionally call someone a stupid cunt and tell someone else to fuck off, well, it's only because they drove me to it.

Canada's Right and "accountability": Because it's always someone else's fault.

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Estranged from both honesty and honour, Peter MacKay chooses Christmas to deliver his master's message. Of course, the terminally stupid will clamour to his side because their bottomless hatred of the moslem middle east will not allow for an opportunity to spew to go by unspittled.

So to Peter MacKay a challenge, if his many "concerns" about "certainly Iran" hold any water, if these deeply undiplomatic and confrontational statements are something he feels he can stand behind, then he and Harper must declare war on Iran. To do otherwise colours them as either cowards or craven liars. In fact, if he is bold enough to use the holiday for this purpose, he must be intensely sure of his standing and a declaration of war should be forthcoming. There can be no other response to these accusations. By stating that a sovereign nation is supplying arms against our soldiers and abetting our enemies in open conflict, well, that describes acts of aggressive war.

When do we invade Pete? Fat fucking Steve seems to think that supporting the troops means getting more of them killed. Fat fucking Steve thinks it makes him look like a player on the international stage and his ego demands nothing less. He wants to look like a player. Well here's the big chance to get ahead of the game and lead. You popinjays want to be tough guys for the world, well put up or shut the fuck up. How about calling that big press conference, all the microphones, the drama of flash photography and the stentorian address, Canada declares war on Iran.

We can borrow fifty bucks and fuel up a couple of boats to head off and invade. All those other countries can come along if they like, I'm sure Mr. Cheney would arrange for some assistance, he's a fucking stand up guy. When he isn't snoozing through important events, he's all about the big time killing. Of course you have proof positive, right Pete? What else could explain such bold words? Never mind those doubting Omars, like Omar Samad, Afghanistan's Ambassador to Canada. What the fuck does he know about the situation that Peter MacKay wouldn't know? I mean come on, Peter fuckin' MacKay, that's the very soul of gravitas there.

But Omar Samad, the top Afghan diplomat in Canada, told CTV Newsnet on Wednesday that there is no evidence about where the IEDs actually originated and who brought them to Afghanistan."Iran is a neighbor and we have good relations," he said. "The point is -- and the questions that have to be answered (and) are being looked at as far as who is involved in this. Is this a smuggling issue? Is this a policy issue by some government? Is this maybe an attempt by arms dealers to bring arms from a certain source?"

How could it be any clearer, Iran who freely provided support and intelligence to overthrow the Taliban and help install the Karzai government, obviously wants a do-over. Because, uh, because of so there and they hate our freedom over here so we have to liberate them over there. The godless bastards have the gall to not attack the Afghanis or us. How could it be any clearer? They haven't got a nuclear weapons program and they haven't attacked us and they haven't been proven to have anything to do with this arms business, jeeziz, they haven't done all of those things to make us look bad and lull us into a false sense of security. Sneaky damned not-Arabs.

The fact that Canada requested American Ambassador Wilkins accompany MacKay and Hillier on this little outing means nothing suspicious okay. Don't go there, he's just a great guy and they like him. He tells good stories on the plane. They borrowed his car for the ride to the airport or something. Ignore it, pretend he wasn't there, it means nothing. What could it possibly mean? Maybe Pete was trying to be nice to him, kiss up a little and maybe score one of sweet Condi's cell numbers. One that doesn't go to an OTB in the Bronx.

Peter MacKay had best be stepping up with something better than "concerns" if he's going to go shooting his fool mouth off. It is unbecoming of a Canadian Minister of the Queen's Government to be casting unfounded accusations about on that world stage. If Peter MacKay is a decent man, a statesman, and if the government he represents was one that cared a fig for honour, he will either produce compelling evidence or he will apologize to the people of Iran and resign from a post that is clearly beyond his ability. If our government is determined that Iran be our enemy, then let it be for something that Iran has actually done and something that we can prove. This sort of petty brinksmanship is un-Canadian and it just won't do.

Not wanting to be left out in the Republican presidential stupidfest, Ron Paul takes a stranglehold on the all-important Neo-Nazi vote. Via the great orange Satan akaKos himself, from a 1992 article in Grand Dragon Paul’s very own Ron Paul Report (emphasis added):

Indeed, it is shocking to consider the uniformity of opinion among blacks in this country. Opinion polls consistently show that only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions, i.e. support the free market, individual liberty, and the end of welfare and affirmative action.... Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the "criminal justice system," I think we can safely assume that 95% of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.

If similar in-depth studies were conducted in other major cities, who doubts that similar results would be produced? We are constantly told that it is evil to be afraid of black men, but it is hardly irrational. Black men commit murders, rapes, robberies, muggings, and burglaries all out of proportion to their numbers.

Is there any page from the Republican play book that Big Daddy Harper isn’t willing to steal? From today’s Canadian Press:

"Nobody is more troubled by that than I am" about the rising number of war dead and wounded, Harper said quietly. "These are our finest men and women. When we lose them these are the worst days I have. I have no worse day than when I get this kind of news."

And is it just me or could Murray Brewster have possibly shoved his nose farther up Harper’s ass? I’m sure Sandy at the “Crock-of-the-Matter” will be all over this shockingly blatant example of conservative bias in the media.

Your hypocrisy and opportunism sometime overwhelm me. Highlighting the “Afghan mission as an example of Canadians' spirit of generosity” proves that you’ve never met a talking point that you can’t hump until the cows come home. And that, once again, you really couldn't give a shit about what the average Canadian wants, only what you think we should want.

Just a little friendly advice from someone who will never vote for you, I wouldn’t recommend using “generosity” as a central plank in your neverending re-election platform/campaign. It just gives your opponents the chance to gleefully point out stuff like this. Or this. Or even this. I'm just sayin'.

In a "surprise" jaunt over to Afghanistan, weepy Pete decided to spend up some of those good, good tax payer dollars to visit the troops. Now that would be a fine, even noble thing were it not for the war mongering and politicking he did on behalf of Junior''s next war of choice. Using a Christmas visit to the troops as cover, the smug little fart took the opportunity to keep the war fires burning with claims of Iranian weapons flowing to the Taliban. CTV has coverage of the visit and quotes MacKay as saying: "Afghanistan has "very negative influences coming in from other countries -- Pakistan, certainly Iran in particular," he said. "We're very concerned that weapons are coming in from Iran, we're very concerned these weapons are going to the insurgents and keeping this issue alive."

I suppose in the wake of the NIE disrupting the flow of premium bullshit about the fabled Iranian nuclear weapons program, somebody had to get to spewing a fresh line of dung. And who better than Peter MacKay. Why, nobody would suspect Condi's sycophantic, milquetoast admirer of catapulting a man-sized portion of weapons grade propaganda. Consider this the first salvo in what will be a winter feces offensive. MacKay has now made a statement that will be repeated. He will of course keep muttering and yammering as he has been programmed to do but look for it to be picked up by the American slaughter porn fanatics. And the key piece of bullshit rationalization has already been uttered. With the proviso that Iran and the Taliban hated each other almost to the point of open conflict, all bets are now hedged on the 'enemy of my enemy is my friend' plan. Fucking yeah. Just like it worked in Iraq. Because the Shia and the Sunni both hated the American invaders so much that they put aside their differences and united their forces to fight the crusaders. Exactly. Bullshit.

Congratulations Minister of Defense, Peter MacKay, you have whored Christmas and used our troops to sow further seeds of discord in the world. After all, things wouldn't be complete without yet another mindless cauldron of slaughter and suffering in the ill conceived war on terror. I'm sure paunchy Steve tucked into his third, forth and fifth helpings of turkey secure in the knowledge that our troops were away from their families helping him play the tough on the world stage. Let me pose this question to the cock noggins running this absurd show, when are pissants like Peter MacKay going to address the role of the Saudis in all of this murderous folly? When is George Bush going to stop holding hands with the funders and bankers of this generational conflict? When are all of the tough guy arseholes like Harper going to shut their gaping pie-holes and work to bring peace to the Afghanis instead of more bloodshed? How many more Christmases will our soldiers be apart from their loved ones for the sake of political blunderers and buffoons, the fat of belly and head?

Screw you MacKay. How dare you use our forces as stage props for your sinister mission. So much for that Peace on Earth line, forget the good will to all men. Just another day, just another political opportunity to put one over. Fuckers.

True to form, the National Post's resident village idiot and Catholic mouthpiece Father Raymond J. De Souza embarrasses his species with yet another example of absurd Biblical apologetics:

A census for the agesFather Raymond J. De Souza, National PostPublished: Monday, December 24, 2007

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled. This was the first enrollment, when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be enrolled, each to his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

(Luke 1:1-5)

Government edicts are often maddening, but the command of Augustus for a census was also providential. The saviour was to come from Bethlehem, and the rigourous census procedures -- everyone back to his hometown -- meant that Mary and Joseph were in Bethlehem for the birth.

The above fairy tale is, quite simply, so fucking stupid, it's not clear where to even start taking it apart.

First, understand that there is not a single reliable historical record of the vaunted census that dingbats like De Souza keep babbling about:

CENSUS/TAXATION: Luke 2:1-4 mentions that Jesus' birth occurred during the time that Caesar Augustus had ordered all of the known world to be taxed. Luke said that every person had to return to the city of his ancestors, to be registered and taxed. Joseph went to Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David. But this universal census and tax never actually happened. The Jewish historian Josephus wrote a very complete history of the Jews in Palestine. He does mention a census which was conducted in Judea in 6 CE. But this was only a local census, not one that would enable "all the world to be taxed." Its purpose was to count the male population so that they could be taxed at a later time. And it triggered a major uprising among the Jews, who regarded a census as against scripture and the will of God. He does not refer to an earlier census and poll tax.

Precisely. But it's not even necessary to get that scholarly to understand that the idea of everyone returning to their "own city" for the sake of a census is simply ludicrous on its face. It shouldn't be hard to envision the indescribable chaos that would result as the majority of the population suddenly had to pack up and leave their homes and jobs for the sake of nothing more than to be counted:

There is no record of a mass migration of adults to their ancestral cities in order to be registered. It would have been totally impractical to hold a census in this way. The primitive transportation systems of the Roman Empire would have been totally inadequate to handle the flow of people. The entire empire would be largely shut down for many months while people were returning to their home towns. Even today, with airplanes, trains, busses and automobiles, it would not be practical to hold a census in this manner.

Can anyone of even marginally sound mind take this story seriously? But, wait ... it gets so much better.

Recall that first bit of the book of Luke:

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

So Joseph was forced to return to Bethlehem because that was "the city of David" and because he (Joseph) was "of the house and lineage of David?" Really? And just how much was Joseph of the lineage of David, one might ask? Uh oh (emphasis tail-waggingly added):

The Scriptures that the Christians wanted to appeal to say the messiah would be born of David's line, so Matthew and Luke faked the evidence to show that this was the case. Matthew 1:1-16, and Luke 3:23-38 show totally different genealogies, Luke's shows 41 generations from David's son Nathan to Joseph while Matthew lists twenty six generations from David's son Solomon.

I'm sorry, come again? Joseph's destination for this alleged census is based on the fact that he's 41 generations removed from his ancestor's home town!?!? Are you fucking kidding me!?!?

In any event, it doesn't take much brainpower and time to establish that this fairy tale is exactly that -- an idiotic fairy tale. But that doesn't stop Father Raymond De Souza from believing it, and it doesn't stop the cementheads at the National Post from publishing his historically ignorant rantings.

Crazy people at Renew America are trying to poison the minds of the world with their oogus-boogus denial of rationality. Hey, what could make more sense than religion when it comes to explaining things? Hmmm.

"There are no permanent victories in politics," a defender of Intelligent Design said. "You do not get paradigm shifts overnight. Whether the ultimate victory is today or it's tomorrow or it's two years from now, people demand that they get open discussion of this issue."

Which is short for, it don't matter how many times or how clearly their claptrap is debunked, disproven and dismissed, they will keep coming back, time and time again. They are the intellectual equivalent of cockroaches. Sure you pay the exterminator to spray but eventually...

This was in response to the Ohio Board of Education voting 11 to 4 to "toss out a mandate that 10th grade biology classes include critical analysis of evolution and an accompanying model lesson plan," according to the New York Times' Jodi Rudoren.

Congratulations Ohio, round on both ends and retarded through and through. Let's just toss biology out of the sciences because it just can't account for people as utterly fucking bewildered as Grant Swank surviving among the fittest.

The whole matter is still in flux and will continue to be. The reason? Because there are intelligent persons who know that Charles Darwin's theory is full of holes. Large holes. Extra large holes.

Holes. Large holes. Swank holes. And they are in flux. Yes, intelligent people who know about holes. I gather Pastor Swank would fancy himself as one of those, both intelligent and a knower of holes. He must grow weary fighting agianst all of that wild speculation, amassed over decades and decades of careful study and findings by those pesky scientists. It must tax poor Grant as he puckers his lips, straining over one of the holes that he knows. I'm sure at the end of the day he's positively Haggard.

I believe, first of all, evolution is a crock.

And a crock is a kind of pot, that over time slowly makes food out of plant and animal parts. But food doesn't just occur. Food needs to be selected and prepared and dare I say, designed. Praise the crock, blessed be the crock.

It takes a lot of faith to believe that I came from an ameba. A lot of faith!

A lot of faith indeed. An amoeba, why how could a little single celled being produce something as massively complex and sophisticated as a mostly hairless ape that has developed both verbal and symbolic language? It would be like imagining that there were some tadpole like being in the issue of a man that would flow forth from the sin of copulation and fill the womb. And perhaps even more than one of these writhing beings, propelled by their tails would find one, invisibly small, single cell among the countless trillions of cells in a woman's body and somehow this wriggling thing would not only find but penetrate this singular, microbial egg cell. And in so doing, it would set in motion a process that caused the woman's cell to combine with the man's cell and to divide and to multiply not once but repeatedly, exponentially. Causing somehow, a viable human baby to come from the improbable union of one minute cell from one body with a cell from another body. You see how ridiculous that sounds. Poppy he cocks, poppy. Why the only sane explanation is an old man that lives in the sky.

So evolution should be taught in Faith Class, otherwise known in parochial schools as Religion Class.

Yes and Jesusology should be moved from faith to science. After all, Jesus is all true, right? So being true, Jesus isn't a theory, Jesus is a fact. And where are facts taught? That's right in science class. Fuckery, we had it all backwards this whole time, silly post-enlightenment types. In this fast paced, modern world, we can't be slowing our kids down with silly theories. No more theory of gravity. Put that notion out of your heads, we are bound to the earth because god in all of his magnificence is pushing down on our heads. Otherwise we'd be floating about and interfering with the birds. Like they say, if god wanted us to fly he'd have given us enormous bladders and an organ that vents hydrogen.

It's a crazy world we live in. Crazier every day. But one of the craziest notions that ever came down the pike is evolution. Who in his right mind would ever believe that the complicated homo sapien derived from a speck? That's getting the larger from the smaller.

Crazy I tells ya, crazy. Why, that kind of craziness is to imagine, in your gin & sin soaked liberal fantasies, that anything would react to its environment and change or adapt over millions of years and billions of generations. Lunacy. Why if that were the case then, gosh, if you cut open a woman there'd be no trace of the rib bone that Adam gave up for Eve's creation. And Christians have cut open a lot of women, mostly witches I assure you, and they do indeed have ribs. Case closed.

When I was in school, we were taught that one of the fundamental postulates is that one cannot get the greater from the smaller. Yet that is what evolution is all about — greater from the smaller. Now that's a crock.

A crock. A full on Proctor Silex, glass lidded crock. Why if we were single celled organisms, that would mean we'd come from something smaller or something. Everyone knows that there is no such thing as symbiosis, no two things can unite to dwell in intimacy and interdependence. No two things that are not the same can be combined in harmony. Else something greater would have come from the smaller. Why that would require the blasphemy of adaptation. That would mean that simple things were capable of learning and adapting and we all know that is not the case. You (and I mean you men) were shaped from mud and your chattel were sprung from our own rib by the handiwork of god. Anything else is a crock, obviously.

Evolution is furthermore an insult to the intelligent brain.

Pastor Swank knows about insults to the intelligent mind. And holes. Whereas this is a balm to the intelligent mind!

That's why the world is crazy when the so-called intelligentsia defend this notion called "evolution." The PhDs do that. The professors do that. The textbook writers and so forth do that. They all get in their clique and stroke one another with this Alice from Wonderland fancy that we all came from a speck.

Craaaaazzyyyy! Tens, nay, hundreds of thousands of sober academics, soldiering away in labs, pouring carefully over the millions of articles, extracts and findings and countless experiments. Hah. How could you possibly imagine that they'd know anything? None of their mad fantasies are even in the bible! Why it is like some drug fueled mind fever and they are trying to infect our precious babies with it. Imagine, these crazed professionals dedicate their entire lives to the rigorous study of biology and their crazy evolution ideas and what have they to show for it? Nothing! Well, except medicine and a few other things but nothing!

Then they throw in the Big Bang Whatever. This complicated universe and planet Earth just blew into place. There's another nuthouse one for you.

Yes. That part is true. Whenever I speak to someone about biological evolution, they immediately start in on quantum physics. Every fucking time. Hah. The earth just blew into place, accreting from the particulate debris of some vast series of cosmic events. How could that make any sense when we all know that Mr. Invisible just wished it all into existence in a week. Crazy nuthousers.

So, back to Faith Class, evolution and Darwin and the boys need to be put in Faith Class. It takes as much faith to believe in evolution as it does in angels and demons and an invisible God. It takes as much faith to believe in Darwin's spin as it does to believe that Jesus fed thousands with a kid's lunch.

So, so much faith. Really. I mean just look at the common sense right there in that paragraph. Jesus fed thousands with a loaf and a fish, which is true and proved because it is in the bible and god wrote that to make sure it was true and because he's god he can do anything. And we all know like he said before that you can't get the greater from the smaller, because that is crazy talk.

Now at least Religion Class is up front about its basic postulate. It starts with faith. Religion Class makes no bones about it. The instructor starts with telling pupils that they have to believe.

You have to believe. You have to. Believe. What could be more clear. You have to believe. So you believe. Therefore it is true.You don't need any of that silly proof to inform your faith like those crazy cuckoo evolutionofascists.

So Christians, for example, say they have faith there is a God of the Bible, angels, demons, heaven, hell, afterlife, saving grace, judgment, and so forth.

Yeah. Not that crazy fairy tale stuff of observation, data and careful study. Good, solid, factual stuff like angels and demons and the mystery of grace and all of it proved by belief, and so forth.

They don't try to prove it. In fact, Christians say that finally all that can't be proven for if mortal could prove it, mortal would be God.

No. They don't try to prove it. If they could prove it, they would have to be god. And they aren't god, which proves that god is what they are not, therefore it is all true.

So unabashedly Christians start with faith and say that if you don't want to have the faith, that's your choice. You have the decision-making powers to cancel out faith for non-faith and that is your right as a free will being.

Yes. If you don't want to believe, that's your choice and we will consign you to an eternal damnation of hellfire and suffering at the hands of the king of the demons who rules in the pits of an abyss called hell and that's the devil. And nothing proves that there is an all knowing, all powerful and all loving, benevolent god like the first of his angels rebelling behind his back. What says omnipotent better than almost losing the keys to all of creation? And because god loves us all so much, if we don't constantly remind him of our faith, he'll commit us to eternal torment. Now that, ladies and gents, is real love.

But when it comes to evolution, the adherents make us hold to that nonsense as a fact. They press it upon us as evangelists of Darwin. And of course it's not a fact any more than fairy tales are facts. Evolution is a theory, and an exceptionally wide-eyed foolish one at that. Nevertheless, it is a mere theory as much as tapioca pudding causes Milky Ways is a theory.

Fuck yeah. Fucking evangelists. Everybody knows that nobody is more sinister and spins more lies than a freaking evangelist. What? Oh...heh heh, never mind that last part. Maybe if we called them evomangelists, yeah, the liars. I tell you folks, how can you trust a theory? A theory isn't a fact, a theory is a fairy tale. And who knows fairy tales better than someone that actually believes in invisbile beings, angels and demons, spirits and monsters and magical realms where we dwell in eternity?

So evolution should be taught in Faith Class if it's going to be put upon the students in public schools. It does not certainly belong in science class. It's not a science. It's not a proven fact. Now of course if there is a chapter in science class about theories, then evolution can be presented as a theory as much as Alice in Wonderland can be presented as a theory. But nothing more than a theory.

I think old Pastor Swank is totally right here. No theories in science class. Theoretical physics, cancelled. Theory of relativity, verbotten. That word theory, why it stands for all manner of devilry. They even snuck it into the scientific method. If you look real careful like, it's hiding right there in the first part of it, hypothesis...thesis...theory! Fuckers. That tears it. No more of that scientific method in the science class room neither.

Yes, the world is crazy. And getting crazier still.

Boy. You can sure say that again Pastor Swank. Here you are, a man of the cloth arguing against faith and fairy tales. Because your faith in invisible realms and magical, supernatural beings is somehow different? When it comes to chosing a flavour of crazy, this ape seems a far better bet to me:

Against all odds, and despite the usual drumbeat of criticism, President George W. Bush has had a very good year. The troop surge in Iraq is succeeding. America remains safe from terrorist attacks. And the Goldilocks economy is outperforming all expectations.

Mortgage mess has government scramblingA look at the moves needed to ward off recession and foreclosures in 2008.December 24 2007: 11:12 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- After a slow and stumbling start, Washington is scrambling to prevent the unfolding mortgage crisis from pushing the country into recession during an election year. There is a strong feeling, though, that the government will need to do more to avert a financial disaster.

Former Treasury secretary Lawrence Summers advocates temporary tax cuts and emergency spending on the order of $50 billion to $75 billion. Such action could help the U.S. from slipping into what Summers, who served under President Clinton, fears could become the worst downturn since the steep 1981-82 recession.

Yes, let's just put that aside for the time being, because now we've got other problems:

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Americans are falling behind on their credit card payments at an alarming rate, sending delinquencies and defaults surging by double-digit percentages in the last year and prompting warnings of worse to come.

An Associated Press analysis of financial data from the country's largest card issuers also found that the greatest rise was among accounts more than 90 days in arrears.

Experts say these signs of the deterioration of finances of many households are partly a byproduct of the subprime mortgage crisis and could spell more trouble ahead for an already sputtering economy.

For the fifth time since 2001, Congress is raising the debt limit, increasing it by $850 billion to $9.815 trillion. The Senate approved the plan on a 53-42 vote Thursday night. The House of Representatives has already signed off on the plan, without a direct vote.

That’s $9,815,000,000,000.00.

According to the folks who follow this stuff closely, the national debt has been rising by an average of $1.36 billion per day since September of last year.

And each citizen now has a share of nearly $30,000.

But Congress has an easy solution to deal with the mounting red ink. Instead of fretting over it, members simply allow the government to borrow more money, much to the consternation of some critics.

“American families don't have the luxury Congress has,” said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., who opposed the increase. “They can't get a new loan or new credit cards after they have maxed out their capability to borrow. Yet instead, every day in this body we do essentially that.”

But it's not like Brian's all that worried. After all, Larry Kudlow over at Clown Hall says things are going swimmingly, and if Larry says it, it's good enough for Brian.

All joking aside, now, how many of you out there take the Blogging Tories seriously? I'd really like to know so I can avoid whatever it is that made you so fucking stupid.

I posted earlier about Ken-doll Mitt’s rather dubious claim that he “saw” his father march with Martin Luther King in 1963 and the outrageous spinning that followed when his claim was thoroughly debunked. CC pointed out that Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo had reported on new eyewitness testimony, via The Politico, which supported the Ken-doll’s claim and suddenly people were demanding apologies to Republican Ken.

It's looking like Mitt Romney might have been judged too quickly on the Martin Luther King business. Two witnesses have now come forward to The Politico, insisting that they saw the late Gov. George Romney (R-MI) make a surprise appearance alongside King in 1963.

My God, could the Ken-doll have actually been telling the truth? Not so much. Better hang on to those apologies, folks, because David Bernstein at the Phoenix, who originally broke the story, has taken Romney’s supposed vindication and kicked it firmly to the curb.

Then-governor George Romney did indeed march in Grosse Pointe, on Saturday, June 29, 1963, but Martin Luther King Jr. was not there; he was in New Brunswick, New Jersey, addressing the closing session of the annual New Jersey AFL-CIO labor institute at Rutgers University.

Those facts are indisputable, and quite frankly, the campaign must have known the women's story would eventually be debunked -- few people's every daily movement has been as closely tracked and documented as King's. As I write this, I am looking at an article from page E8 of the June 30, 1963 Chicago Tribune, which discusses both events (among other civil-rights actions of the previous day), clearly placing the two men hundreds of miles apart. I also have here the June 30, 1963 San Antonio News, which carries a photo and article about Romney at the Grosse Pointe march; and an AP story about King's speech in New Jersey.

A King researcher editing his letters from that time has stated definitively that the two men never marched together; Michigan and Grosse Pointe historians have stated definitively that King was not at the 1963 Grosse Pointe march; Michigan civil-rights participants of the time have concurred; so have those who worked for George Romney at the time.

And then he really goes to town on the Romney campaign:

Bear in mind that the Romney team has a substantial research team (and vast resources for outsourcing more). Bear in mind that the campaign has compiled vast documentation about the candidate's father, particularly his civil-rights activities, long before the Phoenix posed the question earlier this week. Bear in mind that the campaign has direct access to George Romney's materials and documents, his family members, his friends, his former staff, etc.

Believe me, they know the two men never marched together. This is an attempt to rewrite history. And even if it is a small rewriting, it is offensive.

Get out the popcorn, kids, this is really gonna be fun.

ZOMG!! John Cole from Balloon Juice now has pictorial evidence which totally proves the Ken-doll is telling the truth!!

Six weeks after Senator Charles E. Grassley asked six well-known evangelistic ministries to provide information on how they spent donors’ money, only two have complied.

The lawyers for one ministry have asked for more time from Mr. Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, who sent letters to the organizations in early November. Three other ministries have not been in recent contact with the committee or have said they will not cooperate.

Hmmmm. Do you think they have something to hide? Maybe, but that’s not the point of this little exercise. This is (emphasis added):

Lawyers for Bishop Long said in a statement that a letter he sent to Mr. Grassley asserted that the senator’s request “clearly disregards the privacy protections of the church under law and appears to cross the line of constitutional guarantees for churches.”

At the outset, some churches, including those outside the inquiry, argued that Mr. Grassley’s inquiry violated the constitutional separation of church and state. But some legal and church scholars said that the government was within its rights to examine whether tax-exempt entities like churches are abiding by the law.

Wow. I mean really ... just wow.

These holy roller wingnuts must have balls as big as their heads to use a line like that. Let’s just savour it for a minute, shall we? “Mr. Grassley’s inquiry violated the constitutional separation of church and state”. The sheer hypocrisy of it is almost breathtaking. And if you called any of them on it, they’d be all “What? What? I don’t understand what you mean ... Are you accusing me of something? Why do you hate God?”

Maybe they have a point. Really, it’s none of the government’s business what they do with their money. I’m sure they spend it wisely.

After all, it’s not like any evangelical ministers have ever paid off a church secretary so she wouldn’t blab about a little love in the afternoon.

Or used their money to preach intolerance by accusing a Teletubby of advancing the hideous gay agenda.

Or tried to extort money from their followers because “God was gonna call him” if he didn’t raise $8 million by that March.

Can someone order a smarter batch of Blogging Tories? I need more of a challenge here.BONUS CATHOLIC DUMBASSITUDE: From the "Fetuses 'r' Us" HQ sidebar:

6-Year-Old on Way to Sainthood

(Zenit.org).- A 6-year-old Italian girl who cheerfully endured the amputation of her leg and offered it in union with the sacrifices of Christ may become the youngest canonized non-martyr saint.

Awwwwwww ... even if you're not religious, that's a great story. Seriously. How did that turn out, by the way?

Benedict XVI approved Monday the decree recognizing the heroic virtue of Antonietta Meo, who died of bone cancer at age 6 and a half.

Um ... well, then, that's not quite the "Jesus loves you, and they all lived happily ever after" warm and fuzzy meme I was expecting, was it?MORE DOUBLE PLUS GOOD SNARKITUDE: Larry Moran points out how the Dumbfuck-o-sphere is throughly miffed by the organized freeping of online reviews, for which the obvious solution is, of course, a counter-attack of organized freeping of online reviews, until it blows up in their faces, after which they're shocked -- appalled, I tell you -- by the Leftist bullies who engage in something as infantile and classless as the organized freeping of online reviews.